BOGOTÁ — We Colombians felt a heartbreaking sadness on Saturday, both individually and collectively, a pain we had not felt for more than 30 years. The assassination attempt on presidential candidate Miguel Uribe Turbay was not only an assault on an individual, but also a direct attack on our democracy and on Colombia itself.
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Amid the mounting insults and deepening animosities, and after years of failures by successive governments, we became lost in rhetoric and revenge. In doing so, we overlooked a stark reality: that a 15-year-old boy was willing to pull the trigger and shoot a man in the head.
And that is how life is defeated: by indifference or malice, by ineptitude or complicity. The orphans of violence are too many to count, and we are left with the daunting task to explain to our grandchildren what democracy truly means, begging them not to lose faith in a country we are yet to figure out how to defend.
Remembering Miguelito
Thirty-four years ago, Miguel Uribe’s mother was killed. He was then Miguelito, a child about to turn five — the very picture of innocence sheltered by the protective love of two women whom I love and admire from the bottom of my heart: his sister María Carolina and his grandmother Doña Nydia.
Miguel and I have been on opposite sides of the political spectrum, but today none of that matters: all I care about now is that his life is spared.
The families are crying and crying, and wondering how long we will have to live and die in the sights of whichever hitman is on duty.
It is Sunday, noon. Those who know how to pray are praying, the prosecutors are investigating, the doctors are trying to save lives, the nurses are caring, the politicians are making statements, the opportunists are setting fire, the families are crying and crying, and wondering — as we all are — how long we will have to live and die in the sights of whichever hitman is on duty.
The possible and the impossible
These are the three main things in my mind right now:
The first one is that I want Miguel Uribe, who is still in critical condition and recovering from brain surgery, to be saved from this horror. So that he can pursue his calling and see his children grow up; and I wish that, from heaven, his mother can give him the strength to do what is expected of a 39-year-old man: live.
The second one: I wish to express my deepest sympathy to his family.
And third: we must do everything in our power to ensure that in Colombia, weapons never silence, buy, or impede politics. A country without democracy is a country without a future. To build a politics free from bullets, we must begin with something that has been repeated ad nauseam: let’s disarm our words. Let’s disarm the harshness in our voices and the aggression in our writing.
How many deaths will it take for us to learn to dissent with arguments in a democratic way?
Let’s disarm the way we claim to know what’s right, the way we face disagreements. Killing each other verbally and physically will always be the worst idea. How many deaths will it take for us to learn to dissent with argument in a democratic way, and not with fanaticism and gunfire?
Worldcrunch 🗞 Extra!
Know more • Miguel Uribe Turbay, member of the right-wing Centro Democrático (although the party considers itself center-right) has been a member of the Colombian Senate since 2022. The assassination attempt on June 7 happened just one year ahead of the 2026 Colombian presidential elections for which he is seen as a hopeful candidate. Uribe is a strong critic of current President Gustavo Petro of the left-wing Humane Colombia party.
Among the candidates for the next presidency, independent pre-candidate Vicky Davila has been leading the polls, followed by Gustavo Bolivar, a politician close to President Petro. Centrist Sergio Fajardo comes third, and a long line of independent politicians who have seceded from their parties and registered their candidacy.
Uribe has lived a very eventful life, as his mother, journalist Diana Turbay, was kidnapped by the Medellín Cartel in 1990, and later killed during an attempted rescue in 1991. His father, Miguel Uribe Londoño, is a former councilor of Bogotá. His maternal grandfather, Julio César Turbay Ayala, served as president of Colombia from 1978 to 1982.
The day of the assassination attempt, Minister of National Defense Pedro Arnulfo Sánchez posted a statement on X, announcing a reward of up to 3 billion pesos ($720,000) for information regarding the perpetrators. According to President Petro, Uribe had reduced his security team significantly on the very day of the attack. — Rein Arnauts (read more about the Worldcrunch method here)
Let the guns rust
No, to the so-called masters of politics, criminality, power, or folly, I say: differences are not resolved through slander or violence. Widening the divides between us only leads to deeper fractures and greater pain.
Let useless weapons rust in the memory of the harm they have caused.
What would truly demonstrate love for Colombia — not for egos or partisan, economic or personal interests — would be to call urgently those who govern and those who are governed, those who are eligible and those who vote, political parties of all colors and creeds, to come together and abolish the violence we all carry on our shoulders; to commit to banishing words that incite hatred, and let useless weapons rust in the memory of the harm they have caused.
On Saturday, Miguel Uribe was attacked and the authorities have the obligation to put the spotlight not on the 15-year-old boy who pulled the trigger, but on the sinister forces behind the murder attempt. Only then will we be able to forge social and political agreements that prove we are not a society consumed by selfishness and incurable violence.
